The toy car was discovered by cops buried in the ground since Ben went missing in 1991

After digging up more than 800 tonnes of soil investigators located a toy car that the youngster was playing with at the time he vanished.

Detective Inspector Jon Cousins, lead investigator, said last year: “My team and I know that machinery, including a large digger, was used to clear an area of land on 24 July 1991, behind the farmhouse that was being renovated by the Needhams.

“It is my professional belief that Ben Needham died as a result of an accident near to the farmhouse in Iraklis where he was last seen playing.”

Patrick Warren and David Spencer

Patrick Warren, then 11, and David Spencer, then 13, who went missing from their homes on Boxing Day 1996

A policeman saw pals David Spencer, 13, and Patrick Warren, 11, playing by a frozen lake on December 26, 1996 and told them it could be dangerous.

That night David got home near midnight and told his mum he was going to Patrick’s brother’s house.

The boys didn’t go straight there though, with the last known sighting of them at a petrol station at 00.45am on December 27.

An attendant gave them some biscuits and then saw them walking towards a local shopping centre.

In the early hours of the next day, the pair were reported missing.

It was treated as an everyday missing person’s enquiry, with buildings searched and the word put out to media.

Police reportedly thought the boys might be hiding.

There was a press conference held in late January when their mums, Christine O’Toole and Bridget Warren, asked for information, and then in April they became the first missing children to appear on four-pint milk cartons.

Known paedophiles around the area at the time were also questioned, but still there were no leads.

There were searches of surrounding areas too, including a lake which had been looked at in 1997 as well.